Chapter 2 -- Introducing Directory Services

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Chapter 2

Everyone uses directories—on or off the computer. After all, if it weren't for the directory of television listings in the newspaper, you'd waste hours just channel surfing, looking for something to watch. (Maybe you do that anyway.)

Another type of directory that most of us find indispensable is the telephone directory. In fact, telephone directories are the source of the analogy for two searching capabilities that are necessary in computer directories. There's the "white pages" search by attribute, in which you know a name or some other fact about the object and you search using that piece of information. The second type of search, called a "yellow pages" search, is done by category. Having both types of searches available means that you don't have to know much about an object in order to locate it.

The lack of coherent, accessible directories is felt acutely on a network of any size. True directory services—a global catalog of network services and resources—are missing from Microsoft Windows NT networks. The directory functions available in version 4 do provide the all-important single logon and single point of administration that corporate environments need, but they have serious deficiencies when large numbers of users are involved. Attempts to organize documents in folders and directories work up to a point, but as the number of objects scales up, management becomes both complex and onerous.

Heretofore, the best-known computer directory service has been Novell Directory Services (NDS), introduced with NetWare 4.0 in 1993. Unfortunately for Novell, NetWare 4.0 had problems of its own that kept it from becoming dominant in the networking arena.



Microsoft Windows 2000 Server Administrator's Companion, Vol. 1
Microsoft Windows 2000 Server Administrators Companion (IT-Administrators Companion)
ISBN: 1572318198
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2000
Pages: 366

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